Nintendo Reveals Launch Date for the 3DS

While us Westerners were sleeping, Nintendo finally revealed when the world would be able to get the company’s hotly-anticipated handheld. Details were made public during the Nintendo Conference held at the Makuhari Messe Convention Center, which is also the site of the Tokyo Game Show.

The 3D-enabled successor to the DS and DSi platforms will be available on February 26, 2011 in Japan, while North America will get the 3DS in March 2011. The portable will retail for ¥25,000, meaning that it’ll be around $300 for the American market. It will come in two colors, Aqua Blue and Cosmos Black, and each unit will come bundled with a 2GB SD card. Among the features and partnerships Nintendo revealed were:

The 3DS Virtual Console will offer downloadable versions of classic Game Boy titles like Super Mario Land and Link’s Awakening.

They’re launching a new wireless service called WiFine, which reportedly will allow connectivity while outdoors. It’s unclear if this is in partnership with a telecom company or if this service will make it to the United States.

Nintendo will be delivering broadcast 3D content from Japanese TV providers. Like the WiFine service, it’s not clear if this content will be a live stream, available off a download hub or preloaded onto an SD card.

Users will be able to merge two photos into one image.

Augmented Reality will show up on the 3DS in a title called, um, AR Games.

Titles that will show up on the platform include Super Street Fighter IV, Samurai Warriors Chronicle, Metal Gear and Dead or Alive.

Tag Mode, the 3DS’ passive communication feature, will let users swap data even for games that aren’t presently being played.

Thanks to the Mii Studio feature, you’ll be able to automatically generate a Mii avatar simply by taking a picture of a person with the unit’s stereoscopic camera.